This is where that difference in expectations trips people up...your declarations don't need to be from the skill you're using!  Using your stealth example, we could use a Resource declaration of 'I bought a ninja suit'; one from Athletics saying 'I've climbed through the trees to drop from above'; Discipline of 'held very still' with Endurance of 'for an extended period of time'...etc.  I probably wouldn't ever use a Stealth declaration for a Stealth roll...doesn't make sense to gain synergy from itself.  Rolled declarations are all about that synergy...how you claim to have set yourself up for the current action. 

With aspect creation fitting the situation is what matters...the skill is just setting your situation's expectations.  Thaumaturgy simply broadens the expectations because "it's FM".

Which is an excellent use of the game mechanics.  The problem is this: imagine that to succeed in that stealth action you needed 30 shifts.  Even with a 5 stealth and a roll of +4 you would still need to make 11 successful declairations (barring spending fate points) to succeed.  Sounds kind of rediculous IMO.  The books seem to suggest that not only is that perfectly acceptable, but that it should be the norm for thaumaturgy.

I almost feel that treating major rituals as a side quest, making the players role play obtaining the important components solves much of the problem.  It circumvents convoluted declairation stacking.

There is also only so many ways you can recolor stealth declairations for "I silently sneak up behind him, and put a knife in his heart".  Thaum doesnt really have that soft cap to where you just run out of ways to color declairations.

Though using the notion that all thaum is is stacking declairations for one big effect or attack probably goes a long way to prevent confusion between players.  When they know is no different than making a normal declairation for effect, just on a much larger scale.  Though that still doesn't help with the vauge modeling of said spell, just how the resolution works.

First I would say absolutely give them the chance to steal the mordite before the auction if that's what the players decide they want to do.  If they succeed, then the people they stole it from come looking for them.  This gives you plenty of plot to work with.  Do they find the players and try and steal it back?  Or do they tell all the parties who were interested in buying, making it open season against the players.

If they fail then the fall back is to go to the auction and try and obtain it that way.

As for the aeromancer issue.  Talk to the player outside of the game.  Tell him that you both need to work on some new plot hooks for the character together becausehe doesn't really have any conflict or backstory anymore.  This games mechanics are so closely tied into narrative that personal plot hooks need to be there, otherwise you have less opportunity to compel him, which means he will struggle with fate points, and will have a much less dynamic experience.  Make sure he understands that without these things his character will turn into the "tag along guy".

Infrigia. Cold Days. First fight scene.

I'd apologize...but that seems like a bad idea in context.

First off, that wasn't moving the goal posts, Re-read my first post, my core argument has not changed. The precision thing was a side argument that was only tangentially related to the main one.

Second, I'll repeat, line of sight.

Not if you're specifically visualizing and focusing on a creature, not an area, when you cast the spell. This is...not typical, especially of Harry, but it remains doable, IMO.

But we're really just repeating the same exact points over and over again here. Let's just stop and move on, shall we?

Using the books as a justification to bend or break the rules of the game is a failing arguement.  The novels do not follow the RAW, it does not have to take game balance and dice rolls into consideration.  If you want to incorporate something from the books into the game you find a mechanic that fits, you don't ignore rules wholesale.

Second: you keep saying you disagree, but fail to support if with little more than you own opinion and some narrative fluff.  Fluff that's only support is your own opinion.  It's circular logic and mental gymnastics.

Third: I'm reminded of a little blurb in the YS rulebook.  "magic doesn't make things easier, it makes things more complicated".  I would claim it would take a significantly more power, focus, and percision to magically choke someone out from 30 feet away than it would be to just choke them out with you bare hands.

Fact is the RAW for evocation is a lot simplier than you're making it out to be.  It's point, aim, shoot, regardless of the narrative flavoring.  Cold hard logic would dictate that if you have to aim, it means you can miss.

One thing I see is, that most of those refresh costs are wrong.
Ebenezar has 30 spent
O'Suilleabhain has 25 spent
Scarlet has 29 spent
Mordred has 30 spent

I believe at some points you haven't counted the stunts in.

Other than that, I can't really say that much. I don't really like high power games like that. There is a point where people have too much refresh and just take powers because they still have points to spend. If everyone has supernatural toughness and strength, that basically means nobody has it. I guess it would be easier if you tone it down to a 12 or maybe 15 refresh game, that would still be high power, but easier to handle.

I tend to agree, balancing a refresh cost that high from scratch is going to be near impossible.  Especially if the players and/or GM are still learning the games system.  Heck I started my players at 8 refresh and I still had balancing issues due to learning the system.

There's a reason the book doesn't even give suggestions past 10 refresh and pretty strongly suggests only rarely giving out more refresh points as your games goes on.  It's that (according to many reliable people on these forums) the game balance tends to fall apart once players hit the high teens to early twenties refresh mark.  By the RAW suggestions, your main antagonist/s would need a refresh level of almost 400 to not get stomped into the dirt by your players.

That's not a theme, it's an alternate element. There's a distinct difference between the two. "Seelie Magic" is a theme, not an Element. It's a manner of using potentially all the Elements (with fire most common and likely, but still). Storm is not a manner of using other elements, it is not a theme. It is an Element in it's own right with the appropriate thematic scope that implies...just not one of the traditional five. Which is fine, you're allowed others.

This is an important distinction because, sans Sponsor, you can't get thematic Channeling (nor should be able to, probably) but can get alternate Elements. And because of how it interacts with buying up to full Evocation.

while I do agree that "storm" mechanically fits better with sponsored magic.  I would argue that a necromancer, chloromancer, ectomancer, biomancer, ect. don't fall cleanly into the "single element" classification, but are clearly under the Channeling power.

Maybe taking a "self-sponsored" mechanic with a storm theme would be the way to go.

Assuming thats true, I'm not sure I see the value in reducing declarations. I like declarations. I don't find them useless and I'd actually like to see more of them rather than fewer.

for the most part I would agree.  I know my players still have kind of a hard time grasping the full power declairations have, so they tend to only use them for the +2 or reroll.  When the declairations become redundant and don't cover anything that aspects that are already in play do is where I just "trim the fat" so to speak.

In the archive there's a thread with answer from Fred where someone asked how they could duplicate the shape shifting magic from Turn Coat.  Fred's response was to give the PC the Shape Shifting power, charge him the refresh, and explain it as a series of downtime thaumaturgy rites performed off camera.

Another question about the Gatekeeper's method of opening ways was met with the suggestion of giving Gatekeeper the World Walker power - explaining it as a mastery of that method of magic.

Your suggestion is clearly in keeping with those suggestions.  Add in an explanation of how he spent 20 years working on the ring, using rare ingredients in the enchanting, and you've got the perfect answer for when your players ask "How do I make me one of those?".

Richard

I like that idea.  You could even tie that into the characters backstory.  Saying that he went to some pretty extreme lengths to get what he needed to make it, and as a result he's made more enemies in that 20 years than most wizards do in a lifetime.